Thursday, December 4, 2008

TV or NOTV

My wife and I have been considering getting rid of our cable. There are a few reasons why we would do this, and it seems to be a point of debate and consideration in many LDS families. Our's is no different. First of all, our cable bill is like $160 bucks a month or something ridiculous. When you bundle phone, internet, cable, and then add DVR, HD Channels, and a few Movies on Demand each month the next thing you know your cable bill is almost as much as your car payment. That's what me and my friends call ridonkulous. (BTW - I have 65 friends...according to Facebook. I added one more today. My brother Beau. Before that we weren't friends, but now thanks to Facebook we are. I also added my wife on Monday, so that's good. I was getting nervous that maybe she didn't like me, but when I got her friend request I was like "phew." Somehow my facebook network consisted of really obscure friends from high school, my mission, old jobs, and people I barely know. But my wife and my brother only made the cut this week. This is a lot to put in parenthesis. I shuold have put the first part of my blog post in parenthesis, and then left this part outside of parenthesis.) Anyway, our cable bill is ridonkulous, as I was saying, so we thought we might get rid of it. Also, we waste a lot of time watching TV when we could be more productive with our time. Like, if we got rid of cable, maybe I would blog twice a month instead of once. Also, I have some domain names that I own (www.b4ugoogle.com) that I don't know what to do with so maybe I could figure something out if I didn't spend so much of my time watching Lakers and Real Housewives of OC (and sometimes Atlanta). Sometimes I just find myself watching TV no matter what's on. Like a couple days ago I got roped into watching this movie called "Neighbors" with Dan Akroyd and John Belushi from 1981. It was actually pretty funny. So Shalaine has had it on her to do list to call the cable company and turn off our cable - but she chickens out and puts it off. And let's just say I haven't been begging her to make the call either. Maybe after tonight's episode of Survivor and The Office...and they better be new episodes. Is there anything worse than sitting down to watch your favorite show only to realize it's Thanksgiving so I guess that means we're not interested in our TV shows? Last week was angering. My brother in law Eric cursed the TV when we realized that Survivor was just a re-cap episode, and The Office wasn't even on. So then we turned on Mario Kart and just played that for like 3 hours.

But now I've found the perfect reason to not cancel our cable. "The Secret Millionaire." This is the most uplifting TV show I've seen since, well, General Conference I guess. It's a new show on Fox in which millionaires go live in poverty for a week, interact with the poor and needy, and then at the end of the week give away at least $100K to various people in need. This money changes the lives of the poor, and the experience changes the lives of these millionaires. They profiled 2 millionaires last night. One rich lawyer from Newport Beach, and then this 36 year old guy who started a chain of chicken finger restaurants in the south called Rasing Cane's Chicken Fingers. He's worth $60 mil. Anyway, these people ended up giving $100K to a family who had a 10 year old daughter with Leukemia, a lady who houses and feeds homeless children in her own home, a guy who was rebuilding a community center in Louisianna despite the fact that he still hadn't even built himself a home, and others who are poor but usually giving of themselves despite their lack of wealth. It was a great show and my wife and I were almost crying at the end because the stories were so inspirational. It reminded me how blessed I am, while at the same time it reminded me how poor I am - weird. It helped me put things in perspective and not worry about buying a bunch of meaningless gifts this holiday season. So I encourage all of you to not turn off your cable, and make sure you watch this show.

9 comments:

sounds like a good show. never heard of that chicken fingers restaurant, must be in the deep deep south.

I'm cheap but most anything good you can watch on line and so we save a lot of money that way. http://www.fox.com/fod/play.php?sh=secretmillionaire I'm not much of a TV guy though. But if I were a high roller in Palm Springs, I'd probably have cable.

We accidently came across that show the other night--finally a reality show that doesn't have a scheming aspect that shows how horrible people really are. I was not crying...not close to it, but it was a good show. I would be crying if they came to my 750 sq. ft. hovell and gave me $50K though!

I just happened on that show while I was in a dilapidated old Holiday Inn in Orlando this week. I came in about half way through and when they went back to give the money, I was in tears. It was really touching.

Good thoughts about getting rid of the cable. We've had that discussion for 30 years. Just think of all we could have accomplished if we would have done it 30 years ago! Oh well...I'm already too tired as it is. I'd really be exhausted if I would have been being productive all those years.

And finally, I like your suggestion about not giving useless gifts this year, so we are returning all the gifts for you kids tomorrow. Thanks! Maybe now we can afford a new flat panel!

Okay, I have this internal discussion as well but it never succeeds. For one Jon needs to watch his sports and second I need to have some downtime at night to just chill. I think that dad's DVR would be used a tad bit more if you guys got rid of cable. :-) (by the way....loved the parenthesis)